


melted (or, how motor milkshakes got its groove back)

by greencacti



Category: Bandom, My Chemical Romance
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, I apologize in advance, M/M, a happy ending because im a fckn sap, bob is Mad Always, frank never knows whats going on, gerard is kinda oblivious, mikey is, pete really loves sprinkles, ray gets made fun of. a lot. just friendly ribbing but like. a lot., really cheesy, the humor in this is a lil 6th grade if u catch my drift, there, too much hijinks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-01
Updated: 2017-02-01
Packaged: 2018-09-20 14:41:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9496136
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/greencacti/pseuds/greencacti
Summary: "Gerard fucking Way, the guy Frank had had a crush on since he was eleven years old, was right there, witnessing Frank being consumed by toilet water. He must have come in through the back door and no one noticed in the commotion, and now there he was, seeing Frank wrist-deep in the literal shit river. Frank reallycouldkill Ray.'The AU where they all work after school in the neighborhood ice cream shop, Motor Milkshakes, and everything's going great until one day a creepy baby doll that looks exactly like Frank shows up, Patrick breaks the soft serve machine, Mikey hijacks the store sound system, and Ray manages to start a flood in the back room.





	

**Author's Note:**

> warning, this is cheesy as FUCK. like. it's just a fun & cute little short story, but wow. this did not need to be THIS cheesy and frankly i am sorry. i also apologize for the fact that this is pretty gross sometimes, i'd recommend clicking away if you don't wanna read something that is about 50% just the word shit. i don't blame you.

Frank got mail with the wrong name on it all the time. Something about his name just made people wanna misspell it - he had seen Frank Lero, Frank Aero, Frank Iyero, Frank Euro, Frank Oreo, and, on one memorable occasion, _Fronk Zero_ \- so lots of times he would end up with packages and letters with his name spelled wrong on them. Sometimes he just got mail that was deadass for someone else - there was definitely a real Frank Lero out there, and Frank somehow got mail intended for him all the time. Frank Lero was one hell of a fucking guy, if his mail was any indication - in the past, Frank had received several books on black magic, an issue of Bacon Busters Magazine, and a dvd copy of _Bowling for Columbine_ that had all been addressed to Frank Lero. So getting packages with the wrong name on them wasn't really a new thing for Frank, but they always showed up at his _house_. When he walked into work one afternoon to find a Pepto-Bismol pink box addressed to FRNKIERO sitting on the counter, that was definitely a new one.

"Toro? What the fu-" he called into the back of the store, but cut himself off. He glanced around to make sure it was empty - sure, Motor Milkshakes, the ice cream place that Ray's family owned and had been generous enough to give Frank a job at when he managed to get fired from every supermarket in town before he even reached his 17th birthday, usually wasn't exactly _hopping_ with customers at 4 PM on random Thursdays in February, but Frank didn't wanna risk screaming curses across the store if there was, like, a mom with little kids in the store or something. He wasn't _that_ much of an asshole. When he was sure the coast was clear, he called again, "Ray? What the fuck is this package about?"

Ray came lumbering out of the back room carrying giant tubs of ice cream to replace the ones out front, each labeled with what flavor it was. Motor Milkshakes had been open since before Frank was even born, and he and Ray had been friends since elementary school, but Frank had never really payed attention to what the flavors were called until he started working there. He still would almost shit himself laughing every time a customer ordered one of the really weird ones - there was the mint-flavored one called Sitting Bull, a sugar cookie-flavored one inexplicably named Cheryl, and, Frank's personal favorite, a peanut butter one named Bust a Nut. Ray maintained he had no idea why his parents named the flavors such weird shit, but watching him come sashaying out of the freezer holding a gallon tub of ice cream labeled BUST A NUT in all caps was still pretty much always a sight to behold. "What package?" Ray asked. "Did my - " he paused, " _medication_ come?"

Frank snorted. "No, it's not your fucking laxatives. Do they send that shit in bright pink boxes nowadays? Man, I gotta start going to your pharmacy."

Ray grimaced as he set the tub of BUST A NUT in the display fridge. "For the hundredth time, they're not laxatives! I had a stomach thing, alright?" he said defensively. "Maybe it's something Mikey ordered from Zara. He started getting that shit delivered here because his mom kept trying to take his packages."

"No, it's addressed to me - or, to _Frnkiero_ , all one word, no 'A'." Frank pushed the package towards Ray so he could see the label.

"Well - open it," Ray urged. "There's just the two of us on until 8, my parents gave everyone else tonight off to gear up for tomorrow. So you might as well open it now, while the store is empty, in case it's some hot lingerie or something again."

"Fuck you, Toro, that shit wasn't mine," Frank sniffed, tearing through the tape on the box. Another order of Frank Lero's that had accidentally wound up at the Iero house - a set of lacy black lingerie and fishnets that had been unfortunate enough for Frank to arrive the week of his birthday last year. His mom had assumed it was a present from a relative and wrapped it up with the rest of his gifts, and he had opened it in front of his entire family, including his die-hard Catholic grandma, who almost had a stroke right there. It was pretty much the most traumatic moment of Frank's life thus far. "Is tomorrow that Most Precious Blood dance? Jesus, already? I feel like we just went through that hellscape five minutes ago."

Most Precious Blood High School, a Catholic school in the next town over, had their big Valentine's Day dance in the ballroom at the hotel about ten minutes away from Motor Milkshakes. Motor Milkshakes was pretty much the only decent ice cream place in town, and for some reason literally every fucking couple felt the need to stop there for ice cream before or after the dance, so combining that with the usual Friday night rush made it the biggest night of the store's year. The whole staff had to be there, to hold down the fort and serve up as many golden french vanilla - a flavor unfortunately named Mac N Cheese - ice cream cones as possible. It was usually just 5 straight hours of insanity, and Frank wasn't sure if he was emotionally ready to go through it again.

All his thoughts about parochial school-going, ice cream-wanting heathens flew out of his head, though, once he got the package open. It really _was_ a good thing there was no one in the shop at that moment, because Frank wouldn't have been able to keep the profanity in that time. "What the _fuck_ is this?" he squealed, lifting the box's contents out of it. "A _voodoo doll_?"

It was definitely some kind of...baby doll, and it definitely looked like Frank, so _voodoo doll_ seemed like a pretty logical conclusion to jump to. It had delicate features painted on its porcelain face that reminded Frank of the art style in, like, 30's and 40's era cartoons, was inexplicably dressed in a baby sleeper with _bear ears,_ and it honestly would have been kind of cute if it hadn't arrived anonymously in a pink box at Frank's place of work. As it was, though, it was pretty fucking freaky.

Ray's eyes widened. "Who sent that? Did it come with a return address?" Frank shook his head no; Ray cocked his head. "It's kinda cute. It looks like you, but a baby. Baby Frank."

"Baby Frnk," Frank replied, using the sender's misspelling. He held the doll at arm's length. A baby doll, that resembled him, anonymously showing up on the counter of Motor Milkshakes with no return address. What the fuck, honestly. It was pretty much the creepiest thing that had ever happened to him. Baby Frnk, Frank was pretty fucking sure, had to be some kind of threat. "That is so fucking creepy. This is probably, like, a highly cursed object."

Ray shook his head. "Maybe someone who comes into the store a lot has a crush on you and wanted to give you a present. Any of the regulars seem interested?" he joked.

"Other than that old woman who smells like salmon and always orders a 'Thick'? No," Frank snorted. "Thick" was the name of the Motor Milkshake equivalent of Rocky Road, and every week an elderly woman who wore approximately one billion glinting gold rings and a sparkly shawl came in and ordered one. She would pinch Frank's cheeks with her long red nails, call him "Sweet Cheeks", sit at the furthest table from the counter and literally _slurp_ her ice cream, loudly enough that she could be heard from across the store. "Actually, you know what? This _could_ be from her."

Ray laughed and shrugged. "Your mom will like it. Doesn't she love kitschy shit like that?"

Frank gave him a long look. "No _way_ am I bringing this thing home. You wouldn't be laughing if this was you," he asserted. "Like I said, highly cursed object. I've seen a lot of horror movies, I know how this shit goes. It's staying right here." Frank looked around the store, looking for an appropriate place to put _Baby Frnk_.

Ray probably would have argued against Frank finding a new home in the ice cream shop for the maybe-voodoo doll he was anonymously sent, but two customers had come in and wanted to try a sample of the flavor named "Martha", which Ray swore up and down was marshmallow flavored but Frank had tasted it before and he wasn't convinced. Martha tasted like spoiled milk, but was for some reason Ray's favorite flavor, and if the sales for it didn't go up his parents were going to replace it, so there was no way Ray was going to miss the chance to hype up Martha to a pair of unsuspecting innocents. While Ray was proselytizing, Frank took advantage of the distraction and surveyed the room, looking for an appropriate place to put the doll, but there really _wasn't_ an appropriate place in an ice cream store to put a fucking baby doll, so he settled for placing it on top of the display fridge full of Snapple and soda. It almost looked like it was supposed to be there, like a mascot or something. Motor Milkshakes didn't have a mascot, maybe it could have used one.

"You're actually leaving that thing here?" Ray said once the customers were gone, having unsuccessfully tried to convince them to get Martha-flavored cones. "It's gonna scare customers away. The shop hasn't been doing super great lately, we don't need your voodoo doll jinxing it."

"No it won't. It's cute. It's only creepy because we know that it's, like, probably haunted," Frank argued. "And if it _is_ haunted, then take videos of it moving around and shit, put it online, have it go viral, and then sell the rights to the story and have them make a horror movie out of it. You'll be fucking drowning in cash." Frank patted Baby Frnk's head.

Ray looked pretty unconvinced, but he didn't make Frank take the doll home. When Frank clocked out at 8 that night, he spared one last glance at Baby Frnk, perched atop the refrigerator, and tried not to think about how fucking creepy it was that some sender unknown had left him a lookalike baby doll. It might not have been actually _cursed,_ but goddamn, was it unsettling.

* * *

When Frank showed up at 6 the next day for the start of his hellish Most Precious Blood dance night shift, he already knew something was wrong when the place was packed and Ray was nowhere in sight. Everyone else was buzzing around behind the counter, trying to keep up with the 8 million orders pouring in from kids in long dresses and tuxes - Mikey scooping ice cream and looking bored, Pete putting way too many sprinkles on everything, Bob already in an argument with a customer even though according to the schedule he had only clocked in twenty minutes ago, the usual - but Ray was MIA, and on nights like these he was usually ice cream commander-in-chief. Ray's parents' main condition when they agreed to hire his wacky friends to work at the store was that he kept everybody in line, and Ray, the ultimate mom friend, was usually pretty good at that job. The fact that he was missing was the first sign that shit was gonna go down that night.

The kids Bob had been arguing with had walked out by the time Frank got up to the counter, and even Frank, the most inept employee of all time, knew you didn't just let customers walk out the door and lose money. "What the fuck, Bob? Ray would shit if he saw that - where even is Ray?" he asked.

Bob huffed. "Those crazy fucks wanted _ten toppings_ on a small cone. I literally couldn't do it - there's nowhere to even _fit_ ten toppings on a small cone," he lamented. "I told them to cut it down to five, and they got mad and started spewing all this 'customer is always right' bullshit, but you could tell they were the type to come back in here and demand a free replacement when the cone breaks through the bottom before they can even leave the store because it couldn't support ten goddamn toppings, so I wasn't fucking budging." He snorted. "And Toro literally _is_ shitting right now. He's been in the employee bathroom since before I got here - his 'stomach thing' came back."

Patrick, who had just finished making change for a customer, nodded. "I got here an hour ago, and he's been in there the entire time. He has the runs or something."

"Why didn't he just go home? What the fuck," Frank remarked in disbelief. Jesus, only Ray would stick around at work when his _stomach thing_ was apparently acting up enough to land him in the bathroom for upwards of an hour. The Toro work ethic was truly unmatched.

"He said he'd be okay, but he's literally been in there for the past hour. Mikey slipped him some magazines under the door to keep him entertained," Patrick shrugged. "They were magazines that Pete randomly had in his car, though, so like…" He trailed off. "If Ray's reading porn in there, that's why."

"Cool," Frank nodded. "Ray's shitting and reading skin mags, Bob's fighting customers, and there are 800 private school kids coming here tonight. This is gonna be a great shift."

"Go help Mikey scoop. Otter hasn't showed up yet and he needs backup," Patrick said, shooing Frank over to Mikey. There was a crowd of girls up at the counter, but that was normal when Mikey was scooping. Mikey hated scooping more than pretty much any other task - he didn't like the fact that the job required, like, actually speaking to customers - but everyone knew why he was always stuck with it: he was the eye candy of the Motor Milkshake operation. There were groups of girls who came into the store specifically to see him, apparently drawn to his sleepy eyes and unenthused disposition, and everyone knew it, so he always got put on scooping so he would be at the center of the action. Sex sold, even in ice cream stores.

"Yello," Frank heard Mikey flatly greet three girls in velvet dresses who had nudged each other when they saw him. He was scooping three cones for them - two No Comment, the dark chocolate flavor, and one Sheila, the cotton candy flavor - and shot Frank a long, knowing look. Being the Motor Milkshake sex symbol wasn't easy, apparently.

"Otter probably isn't coming," Mikey said under his breath as he scooped. "He said he has the stomach bug - yeah, right." He rolled his eyes.

"Otter isn't coming?" Frank exclaimed. "What are we gonna do? Ray's out of commission, Bob's starting fights, and we're already almost out of Sitting Bull."

"We might have to call backup. My brother said he might come help as a favor to the Toros, but that's only if he decides to come out of his cave," Mikey replied, rolling his eyes. "If he does, try not to, like, fucking grind on him, thanks." Mikey passed the two No Comments and the Sheila to Pete to add toppings to and gave Frank a long, accusatory look.

"Fuck you, wow," Frank said under his breath as the next customer approached. So Frank _sort of_ had a crush on Mikey's brother, and he _sort of_ had had it since the first time he ever had come over to Mikey's house in the 6th grade. It had only been like 2 months into the school year, and Frank, who had firmly believed his reputation in middle school would set him up for the rest of his life - what a fucking joke, honestly - had wanted to play it cool in front of his new friend. And he _had_ been playing it pretty cool, up until he realized the cool 7th grader he had been staring at every day on the bus since the first day of school was getting off at Mikey's stop with them, and walking up Mikey's driveway with them, and into Mikey's house with them, and _holy shit,_ he was Mikey's _brother._ When Gerard had sat down with them at the kitchen table to share their afterschool snack, Frank had almost fucking fainted. It had taken Mikey about two seconds to figure out what was going on, but he was surprisingly cool about the whole thing. He said he didn't care if Frank liked Gerard, as long as Frank promised to never, ever share his, quote, "sexual dreams" about him with Mikey. Mikey had always had one hell of a way with words, even in 6th grade.

Back then Gerard had automatically been cool because he was a year older and had long, dyed black hair - Frank's mom would _never_ let him dye his hair - and he always was listening to music when Mikey and Frank would pass by his closed bedroom door on the way to Mikey's room. Sometimes Frank would try to catch different lyrics of the songs to Google when he got home, which _definitely_ wasn't weird at all. Once Gerard hadn't been home, and when they had passed his room, his door had been open and Frank could see a bunch of little figurines sitting on his windowsill. At first he thought they were action figures, but they had a distinctly handmade look to them, tiny and delicate.

"What are those?" Frank had asked. Mikey had snorted.

"Weird little figures he makes. They're supposed to be elves or something, I think." Mikey's tone implied that they were obviously lame, but Frank didn't think so. He couldn't do _any_ kind of art - he couldn't draw, or paint, and all his art class ceramic masterpieces had blown up in the kiln and taken the rest of the class's pieces down with them - so being able to make cool little figures made Gerard even more awesome. Frank had only been 11, but he had been pretty sure this was true love.

But despite all the times he had came over, slept over, eaten dinner, and even went on fucking vacation one time with the Way family in all the years since, the Frank had barely actually _talked_ to Gerard. Sure, he had _tried,_ but Gerard was easily the most reclusive person Frank had ever met. He was always in his room, which had migrated from upstairs down the hall from Mikey's to in the basement at some point between 6th grade and the present, which meant Frank saw even less of him than before. So it had basically just been five and a half years of pining and getting made fun of by Mikey and no action whatsoever. Kinda sad.

"I'm just saying. He's been working on some big art project for, like, a month and a half now, though, so I'll be surprised if he even comes," Mikey shrugged. "Get the next person," he said, referencing the customers. "I gotta get more Sitting Bull."

Mikey disappeared for more than half an hour - so much for "getting more Sitting Bull" - and in that timeframe Frank scooped at least three "Chernobyl Chunk" cones, a cookies and cream flavor that was usually tied for least popular with Martha because of the name alone. Bob managed to start two more fights with customers, Patrick somehow jammed the soft-serve machine which Frank didn't even know could _happen,_ and Pete dropped the entire canister of chocolate sprinkles on the floor. Things were fucking rough.

By that point the shop was packed, and no one could keep up. Patrick tugged on Frank's sleeve. "Can you go find Ray and ask him what we should do? We can't do this. Every time I serve one person, five more show up. They're multiplying. It's never been _this bad."_

"It's because of that fucking haunted doll you brought in here," Pete said as he pumped way, way too much hot fudge on some poor kid's sundae. He jerked his head in Baby Frnk's direction, still perched on top of the fridge, watching the whole scene with his weird Mona Lisa eyes that seemed to follow Frank wherever he went. "Ray told me about it before he started spewing shit everywhere. That thing's _creepy,_ man."

"It's fucking cursed, I agree, but I wasn't bringing it home. Let it curse the ice cream shop, not my house, thanks," Frank replied. Mikey finally emerged from the back room then, sans-the Sitting Bull he had said he needed in the first place. Frank shoved his scooper in Mikey's hands and said, "Here. I gotta go ask Ray what the standard protocol is for when the shop gets cursed and none of us can keep up with demand."

Ray was still in the bathroom. Frank was starting to wonder whether they should call an ambulance for him or something, because something had to be seriously wrong to land you in the bathroom for upwards of two hours. The Motor Milkshakes bathroom was single-person (and blessedly employees-only), so Frank cautiously knocked on the door. "Uh, Ray? There are a thousand Catholic school kids out there, the baby doll put a hex on the shop, Bob's fighting with everyone, the soft serve machine's broken, Otter never showed up, and we're out of Bust A Nut. What do we do?"

There was a pretty long silence, to the point that Frank started to wonder if Ray was actually dead in there, but then he heard a long, uncomfortable groan. "Jesus," Ray said through the door, followed by another grunt that Frank wanted to delete from his memory immediately. "I knew I shouldn't have had Indian for lunch, but I didn't realize I was gonna put the shop in peril because of it."

Cool. Confirmed, Ray was in there shitting out a fuckton of Indian food. Frank really needed that mental image. "As concerned I am for the state of your asshole, we really need backup. Are you coming out any time soon?"

Another long moan. Jesus. Frank regretted ever volunteering for this, because he was pretty sure the sounds of Ray's shit grunts were going to be permanently burned into his brain. "Probably not…Just try to keep everyone in line, and take Bob _off_ toppings, for the love of God." Ray murmured something to himself about needing a crew that wasn't comprised of _fucking animals,_ which Frank thought was a _little_ unfair considering at least he, Bob, Patrick, Pete, and Mikey weren't spending the entire shift shitting their brains out in the employee bathroom. But yeah, he kind of got where Ray was coming from. "How did you break the soft serve machine, by the way? What the fuck are you guys _doing?"_

"It wasn't me!" Frank defended. Sure, he had broken the smoothie machine, the milkshake machine, and the hot fudge dispenser on two separate occasions, but _this one_ wasn't his fault. "It was Patrick. Good thing soft serve isn't really that popular tonight, because these kids would probably fucking riot if they wanted it and couldn't have it. They're _nuts._ They're loving Chernobyl Chunk though, we've sold, like, three of them."

Rau grunted again - Jesus, they would probably be able to hear him out in the front of the shop if Mikey hadn't hijacked the sound system at some point during his half hour disappearance and started blasting Smashing Pumpkins at full volume, something he wouldn't have gotten away with if Ray hadn't been AWOL - and called to Frank, "Make sure to sell some Marthas!"

If he was still hyping Martha during these trying times, Frank figured Ray was _probably_ gonna be okay without a trip to the ER. "I'm not forcing your fucking spoiled milk kink on everyone, bye," he said, laughing when he heard Ray aggressively groan again.

When he got back out there, things seemed to have _kind of_ calmed down. Sure, there were still a fuckton of people in the store, but it was a more normal Friday night crowd, kids and their parents and shit and not angry teenage couples in black tie evening wear, and that immediately made Frank feel better. Things started to get back on track; Pete somehow got the soft serve machine working again which prompted him to announce "I _DID IT!"_ and caused the entire shop to erupt into cheers even though almost none of them actually knew what he had accomplished. Mikey found another tub of Bust A Nut in the way, way back of the freezer, and Bob took a break from having a personality conflict with literally every person on earth, so that was an improvement. By 8:30 things were really starting to settle down - the dance was in full swing by then, so most of the Most Precious Blood crowd had cleared out and wouldn't be back until after the dance ended around 10 and the second wave came through - until Patrick came out of the back room where he had gone to get more mini M&M's and asked, "Um, guys? What's with the water all over the floor in there?"

"What water?" Bob asked. Patrick shrugged.

"I don't know. There's a huge puddle on the floor."

Patrick and Mikey stayed out front to serve customers while everyone else went back to check out the "huge puddle", which turned out to be the understatement of the fucking century. It was practically a goddamn _tsunami_ in the back room, and it was going to come flooding out into the front any minute. "What the fuck?" Bob exclaimed. "Where is this even _coming from?"_

"Uh, the rain, maybe? It's pouring outside, maybe there's a leak?" Pete supplied, eyes darting around.

"It must be one hell of a leak," Frank replied, rolling his eyes. "There's _so much_ \- did somebody leave a sink on back here or something? What the fuck is this?"

"The only sink is in the bathroom, and Ray's had that tied up for _hours._ Like, I'm getting worried about him," Pete said. "It's been a _really long_ time."

"You don't think...Ray clogged the toilet, or anything like that, do you? This isn't his fucking _toilet water,_ is it?" Frank asked, praying to the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, and just about every other god he could think of that this was a faulty water pipe or _something_ and not actual fucking _used_ toilet water, but when they darted to the employee bathroom, lo and behold, the water was spewing out from under the doorway at high speeds.

"Ray! What the fuck are you doing in there, snorkeling?" Frank demanded, pounding on the door.

"Um. So," Ray said through the door, "there might be a little water headed your way."

"A _little water?"_ Bob repeated. "We're about to need a fucking ark to save all these Catholic school kids from drowning in your shit water. It's still coming!"

Frank lifted up the hems of his jeans to keep them from getting wet. His shoes and socks were fucking goners - _no way_ was he putting them back on knowing they had been baptized by Ray's _shit water_ , as Bob put it - but these jeans were the only black pair he had at the moment thanks to his dog ripping through the pile of laundry he had left on his bed to put away last week. He couldn't let them get caught in Ray's crossfires. "What did you even _do?_ How much are you shitting? It's a goddamn flood out here!" He banged on the bathroom door again.

"I guess I put a _little_ too much in -"

"Wow, nice, Toro," Bob said, rolling his eyes.

"Too much _toilet paper,_ okay, toilet paper, not too much _shit._ Dear God."

"Ray, we're up to our fucking _ankles_ out here. It's gonna get out front!" Pete exclaimed.

"I'm not doing much better in here! It's been overflowing for five minutes and it won't stop! I'm not opening the door, if I do literally gallons of water are gonna come out. Can you guys call a plumber? And _close_ the back room door, it'll keep the water out a little longer!" Ray replied. Wow, he was able to formulate a plan even as the store was about to go down at the hands of his own shit water. Mad props.

"Frank, stay here and try to block off the bottom of the door with towels or something, I'm gonna call a plumber," Pete said, patting Frank on the head and darting back out front, probably just trying to get away from Ray's shit tsunami. Frank couldn't blame him - the water _looked_ clean, sure, but Ray had been in there for, like, _three hours._ They all knew the truth.

"Why me? I don't wanna dam the fucking shit river," Frank argued, but Pete was already gone.

Mikey poked his head into the back room. "Can you guys stop yelling? I'm getting complaints. What's happening? A shit river?" he asked in a bored voice, completely ignoring the literal monsoon going on the back room. He shook his head. "Honestly, I don't wanna know. Just keep it down." Then he smirked, and said, "By the way, tell Ray Julie just got here. I know he nuts at the sight of her rimless glasses."

Frank snorted, despite the current situation. Only Mikey could sound so unenthused by the phrases _shit river_ and _nuts at the sight of her rimless glasses._ "Ray! You're gonna wanna stop shitting! Your middle-aged dream woman just arrived!" He scrounged around for towels, looking for something to stop the flood.

" _Julie's_ here?" Ray squeaked through the door. "Oh my god. I can't let her see this. We gotta stop this." There was a pause. "And she doesn't look middle aged!"

"You weren't concerned with stopping the shit tsunami before?" Frank exclaimed. "What the fuck, Ray, I'm looking for towels to stop the store from _flooding with toilet water_ and you're worried about impressing the world's blandest girl. Fucking priorities, man."

"I'm _trying,_ okay!" Ray argued. "Is anyone serving her? Don't fuck this up, okay, guys?"

"Uh, considering you started the shit river, I don't think we're the ones fucking up," said Mikey, pushing his glasses up. "And I got Bob to serve her, I couldn't do it. She would start telling me another story about her water skiing team. I didn't even know those _existed_ before she started telling me a hundred stories about it when all I asked for was her order."

"Leave her _alone,_ okay," Ray demanded, and Mikey rolled his eyes and went back into the storefront, because it was pretty hard to take orders from a guy who was flooding an ice cream store with his own toilet water.

Frank had managed to find a few towels lying around, but in order to shove them under the door, he had to _kneel down in Ray's toilet water_. It looked like the jeans were going to have to go too, because at this point Frank's entire body from the waist down had been contaminated. "I hope you appreciate this," he muttered darkly. "If you fucking drown in there, just know you deserved it." He pushed the towels under the door, but the water just kept getting through. "Jesus, Ray! I can't stop it! Isn't there something to turn off the water to the toilet in there?"

"I already turned it off! It's still coming!" Ray sounded appropriately distraught. Knowing you were gonna die, drowned in your own sewage in the bathroom of your parents' ice cream shop before you could even graduate high school could do that to a guy. If Ray somehow did live through this, it wasn't going to be for that much longer, because Frank was going to strangle him the second he got his hands on him for putting him through the Great Mississippi Flood, part 2.

"Uh? What's going on here?" Frank heard a voice behind him say. "Mikey texted me and said you guys needed help...I didn't realize he meant...whatever this is."

Frank whipped around. Standing with him in the flooding back room, looking damp from the rain, confused as hell, and in general like the most beautiful thing Frank had ever seen was _Gerard._ Gerard fucking Way, the guy Frank had had a crush on since he was _eleven years old,_ was right there, witnessing Frank being consumed by toilet water. He must have come in through the back door and no one noticed in the commotion, and now there he was, seeing Frank wrist-deep in the literal shit storm. Frank really _could_ kill Ray.

"So," said Frank, trying to play it as cool as he could while being drowned in toilet water. "Ray shit so much the toilet overflowed and now it's flooding the store. Help."

"Who are you talking to?" Ray asked through the door. "Is that Gerard?"

"Yeah, Ray, it's me," Gerard said, stepping cautiously through the flood. "Um, what the fuck?"

" _Listen._ This was an _accident,"_ Ray defended, like anyone would flood a store with their own shit on purpose. "Is it out in the store yet? This is _bad."_

"No, it's only in the back room right now, but it's _gonna_ be out there if you can't stop it. Did anyone call a plumber?" Gerard asked.

"Uh, I think Pete did?" Ray said. "Someone ask him."

"Pete!" Frank called, still trying to stop the flood with the towels. "Did you call the plumber?"

"Yeah!" Pete called back. "She said she's coming!"

"Oh, no, a female plumber? Ray's gonna nut. You know how he loves capable women," Frank snorted. Ray _nutted_ at pretty much every girl, so everyone had to make fun of him all the time for it, even amid shit floods. It was basically a Motor Milkshakes job requirement.

"Stop yelling through the store!" Ray demanded, ignoring the _nut_ comment. "The customers are gonna hear!"

"You're just worried _Julie_ will hear. She's still out there, by the way. I can see her talking Patrick's fucking ear off. He's the only one nice enough to listen," Frank laughed. "She deserves to know she's gonna drown in your shit if she doesn't get out of here. Do you have any tips for talking to girls who get flooded by your toilet water, Gerard?"

"I mean, I know it's not the most important thing right now, but if you _do_ have any tips, Gerard -" Ray started.

"I can still hear the toilet _hissing_ in there," Gerard argued. "Even if I _had_ girl advice for you, I wouldn't give it to you through a bathroom door while a toilet overflows in the background."

"Girls like you, Gee!" Ray insisted.

"Toilet, Ray!"

Before Ray could request any more _girl advice_ , praise fucking be, the plumber showed up. Pete made a grand show of leading her into the back room. "So. Here's the problem," he announced, gesturing at the room, which was pretty waterlogged at that point.

The plumber's eyes widened. "There are still customers out there while this happening?" she asked, bewildered. "This is a health code violation. You have to get everyone out of here, I can't work on this knowing there's food out in the open with this going on."

So they had to close for the night, two hours early on the biggest night of the Motor Milkshake year, before the 10 o'clock crowd could even come through, because Ray somehow shit so much he busted a pipe or something. Frank couldn't believe it; it took the plumber another _half hour_ to stop the water, and when Ray finally emerged from the bathroom for the first time in four hours he looked like he had been through a war. Frank had blown _any_ chance he had had at looking cool for five seconds in front of Gerard because he was covered in toilet water the entire time, Ray's parents rolled in at some point around when the store was _supposed_ to close and promptly freaked the fuck out at the water damage Ray had caused, and in the middle of it Otter texted Frank to say, " _heard abt the shit river. glad 2 have da stomach bug!"_

"Literally cursed," Frank said, shaking his head. "This store is literally fucking cursed."

* * *

Ray texted Frank the next day telling him there was a "holy shit important!" emergency meeting on Sunday morning to discuss what had happened Friday night, and when he rolled in five minutes late to it everyone else was already there, including Ray's parents and Brian, the assistant manager. Frank wasn't _usually_ late to work, but there he was, the last straggler to the shit river damage control meeting. Even _Otter,_ who would literally show up late to his own funeral, beat Frank there, and he hadn't even _been there_ on Friday. Everything at Motor Milkshakes had been completely out of whack for the past 48 hours. Like Frank had said before - cursed.

"So. Does anyone want to explain what went on here Friday night?" Ray's dad asked, like they were in the principal's office or something. It wasn't anyone's _fault_ that the shit tsunami had happened; Ray couldn't _help it_ if his "stomach thing", whatever the fuck that meant, had acted up, and there was no standard protocol for what to do when the employee bathroom toilet decides to flood the store on one of the biggest sales nights of the year. They had even called in Gerard, who didn't even work there, to help at the price of what little dignity Frank had had left at the point of being crouched on the floor, covered in toilet water. They had _tried._ Frankly, Frank didn't think this warranted a meeting. Ray's uncontrolled bowel movements were not a company issue.

"Uh, Ray clogged the toilet?" Pete supplied.

"And...none of you did anything about it?" Brian demanded. If Motor Milkshakes was Brian's store, Frank and his little squad probably would've all been fired forever ago, even without the shit river incident. Hiring almost exclusively teenagers as employees was pretty much never a good idea anyway, and considering how often they were left alone there with no higher-ranking supervision like they were on Friday, it was honestly pretty surprising something like this hadn't already happened before.

"No, we _tried,"_ Bob argued. "We called a plumber, right? What were we supposed to do?"

"Yeah, but how long did you guys let it go on _before_ you actually called the plumber? The back room is fucking obliterated. The floors have to be completely redone," Brian insisted. Frank hadn't seen the carnage left behind by The Great Shit Flood, but he figured it had to be pretty bad considering they were holding the meeting in the front of the store instead of in the back like they usually did. They were usually open on Sundays, but had been closed all weekend in the aftermath of Friday. At least three people came up to the door anyway during the meeting even though the closed sign was right there, everyone in town knew Motor Milkshakes was closed for the week to recover from a "major plumbing incident", and it was 9 in the fucking morning. Some people would stop at nothing to get their damn Bust A Nut, evidently.

"We thought we could _handle it,"_ Ray insisted, which Frank imagined sounded pretty loaded coming from the guy who couldn't even handle his own bodily functions.

"If it's any consolation, the toilet thing got Julie to finally leave," Mikey added. Julie was pretty famous at Motor Milkshakes, partly because everyone knew she was the love of Ray's life and partly because she would show up and stay for _hours_ because she was under the impression she and Frank's gang were friends for some reason. The only one she really didn't ever talk to was Ray, which was a pretty sad case of irony. "She started asking if she could take pictures of me for her latest 'art project'...Anyone break the news to her yet that she can't draw?"

"Julie _can_ draw," Ray argued. Frank snorted.

"Pretty sure my fucking dog could draw better pictures than that. I heard her asking Gerard for pointers on getting into art school during passing time the other day - uh, step one, stop drawing in crayon," he said, rolling his eyes. Frank honestly loved his job; he could wear his nail polish and his lip ring, swear in front of his bosses, _and_ drag their son's dream girl and not get fired. At his last job at the grocery store he got fired for _vaguely suggesting_ they get a better bagging system. Motor Milkshakes was such an upgrade. Sure, he was lactose intolerant so he couldn't actually eat most of their shit, but he knew how to appreciate a good thing. "By the way, when I say 'my dog', I mean the dead one."

"What do you all have against Julie!" Ray demanded.

"Ray. That _really_ isn't the biggest issue at hand right now," his mom said sternly.

"I'm _just saying_ ," Ray insisted. " _Frank_ listens in on Gerard's _private conversations_ all the time, and no one gets mad at _him."_

"Ray!" Frank boomed. He _totally_ didn't purposely _listen in_ on Gerard's conversations, he just _happened_ to be _near_ Gerard a lot. Gerard's brother was one of Frank's best friends, and they had a lot of other mutual friends. Any eavesdropping was _completely coincidental._

Brian sighed heavily. "As much as I know you would all like to turn this meeting into a Julie roast, there was an actual reason we called you guys here."

"To discuss Ray's shit?" Otter asked. Jesus, they really _were_ lucky they had lenient bosses. This shit really probably wouldn't fly anywhere else.

"No," Brian said sharply. "We have...bad news for you guys."

Frank' immediate first thought was that maybe they _were_ getting fired after all, because even he knew the shit river would be grounds for unemployment under most circumstances, but instead, Ray's dad sighed and said, "If something doesn't change, we're going to have to close the shop."

There was a pretty shocked silence. Even Mikey looked alarmed. Motor Milkshakes had been around for over _twenty years,_ and one bad night was gonna sink it? Frank couldn't believe his ears. " _What_?" Ray said, shocked. Wow, they didn't even tell _Ray_ beforehand, and it was his family's business. Shit had to be pretty dire.

"We've been hanging on by a thread for a while, honestly," Ray's mom said sadly. "We had hoped all the Most Precious Blood kids would help put us back on track, but between closing early and what repairing all the water and plumbing damage is going to cost, we aren't going to be able to keep going much longer."

"There has to be _something_ we could do," Patrick insisted. "Everyone loves this place. Maybe people would be willing to donate or something."

Frank thought that sounded like a pretty good idea. There were only two other ice cream places in town, and one of them was Dairy Queen which was only even open in the summer. The other one was called Fruity Swirls and was weirdly health-conscious and in general fucking disgusting, so Frank figured people would probably be willing to donate _something_ to keep the town's only decent ice cream place around. Ray's dad shook his head, though. "It's more money than I think we could really ask people to donate. We're talking _a lot_ of money."

They kicked around ideas, but for the most part it seemed like there would be no way to save the store no matter how many Chernobyl Chunks they sold. Ray's parents were against the idea of the online crowdsourcing SAVE MOTOR MILKSHAKES campaign Pete thought would be genius, and and even though they decided they would do a big event to try and get as many people possible to come in to try and get back in the black, it was still going to be more money than could be raised through selling $3-$7 ice cream cones. So, unless a literal fucking miracle pulled through, Motor Milkshakes was gonna close, Ray was gonna lose his family business, the entire town's only option for ice cream until May would be Fruity Swirls' _celery-based_ "frozen treat" with chia seeds and quinoa as toppings, and Frank was gonna have to go back to bagging at Safeway or some other shitty job like that.

Literally. Cursed.

* * *

"Guys. We gotta do something," Ray said seriously. They were in Frank's basement, huddled on the beanbag chairs he had had since 4th grade, trying to come up with some kind of gimmick or some shit to get people to come in on the _SAVE THE MILKSHAKES_ night they had planned, but other than making fliers most of their ideas were no-gos. It turned out that saving an ice cream store from certain death was harder than it looked.

"I can't believe this is happening," Pete said. "Motor Milkshakes is, like, a fucking landmark. It's my entire childhood, and my teenagehood, and my every-other-hood. It's my hood. We can't let it go."

Otter blinked. "Poetic."

Pete shoved his shoulder. "You know what I mean. Remember we used to go there after the book fair in elementary school? Memories."

"All I remember from that is Ray puking his guts out in front of the whole store two years in a row," Frank laughed. "Wow, you haven't really changed when it comes to controlling your bodily fluids."

" _Listen._ I was lactose intolerant back then. It was rough," Ray defended.

"First of all, you don't _outgrow_ lactose intolerance, and second, I actually _was_ lactose intolerant back then, and you know what I did? Got a sherbert and dealt with it without blowing chunks all over other customers," Frank retorted.

"Hey, I never threw up _on_ anybody!" Ray argued.

"Uh, yeah you did, one time," Patrick reminded, shrugging. "Remember the fall carnival in 5th grade? When you ate three orders of nachos before going on that hang glider ride?"

Ray groaned. "That was a _totally different thing."_

"Wow, what the fuck did I miss out on?" Mikey asked. Since they hadn't met Mikey until middle school, he had missed _most_ of the Ray throwing up stories. There were a pretty unfortunate amount of them, especially considering Frank was supposed to be the one with the fucked-up stomach.

"Don't worry, you were there for the most important Ray puking story," Bob consoled him. "Him throwing up on Lydia Green's shoes right before 8th grade graduation and her threatening to call the cops will always be the best one. That was fucking iconic."

"Ugh, that was so embarrassing. I had such a big crush on her and you _puked_ on her, Ray," Frank huffed. "You puked on my middle school dream girl."

"Oh, please, we all know who you were really after that day." Pete rolled his eyes. "You asked me at least four times if you looked okay before going up to get your diploma because you knew _Gerard_ was in the audience."

Mikey made a face. "Why did I miss all the Ray puking stories, but I had to be there for every single Frank wanting to fuck my brother story?"

"I didn't want to _fuck_ him. It was 8th grade. I was _innocent_ ," Frank insisted. Why did all the good Ray bodily function stories always have to turn into sad Frank pining after Gerard stories? Unfair. Frank would rather discuss Ray's puke, thanks.

Otter huffed. "You were _not._ I remember seeing the search history on your computer one time back then. There were a few Google searches I'm still trying to forget."

Frank shoved him. "Can we not talk about this? I wanna talk about Ray puking more. I have more stories."

"Guys!" Ray demanded, probably trying to change the subject from the myriad of stories about him vomiting. "This is serious! What are we gonna do?"

"Well, step one is take that haunted fucking doll out of the store and see if conditions improve," Bob supplied. "It stared at me all shift. Things have been bad ever since Frank brought it in. Get it out of there."

"I'm _not_ taking it home, I already told you," Frank argued. Baby Frnk totally _was_ cursed and probably could be blamed for the Motor Milkshakes downfall, but no way was Frank bringing it home. He was not gonna bring that bad voodoo magic into his house. "And I didn't _bring it in._ It just showed up there."

"Well, that's even creepier. Why didn't you just throw it out?" Bob asked.

"Uh, I've seen way too many horror movies to make that mistake," Frank insisted. "It would probably show up again the next day, only now it would be _angry."_

"Would it kill you guys to _please_ be realistic for, like, five minutes?" Ray huffed.

"It might," Frank replied, patting Ray's shoulder.

* * *

"So I heard about Motor Milkshakes," Gerard said, tapping the end of his pen on his chin. "Ray's freaking out. He actually said the words 'I ruined my parents' livelihood with my shit' to me."

Gerard and Frank had one singular class together, creative writing. They usually didn't really talk during it. They sat next to each other because they were the only people either one knew in the class, but Gerard was practically fucking _silent_ in class, a complete opposite from how Frank saw him when he was with his friends. Mikey said it was because Gerard got nervous in rooms of people he didn't know, but it was _February,_ so that excuse was starting to get a little suspicious. It turned out the Motor Milkshakes predicament was actually a great conversation starter, though, because Frank and Gerard were finally _talking._ Sure, they talked all the time, but that was always with someone else there. This literally could have been the first one-on-one conversation they had ever had.

"No one knows what to do. We're holding this big 'Save Motor Milkshakes' night where we're gonna try to get, like, the entire town to come in or something, but even if they all did, it _still_ probably wouldn't be enough," Frank sighed. "We have to make up for all the money they would've made off the Most Precious Blood kids, _and_ make back all the money that had to go into repairing the water damage. It would take a fucking miracle."

"Maybe you need an incentive to get people to spend more money that night," Gerard suggested. "Raffles or some shit? People fucking _love_ raffles."

Frank shrugged. "What are we gonna raffle off? We don't have money to buy anything. I think we're doing some kind of raffle contest where you get to name a new flavor if you win or something." He snorted. "Martha's finally getting the axe. They're replacing it with a strawberries-and-cream type thing."

Gerard giggled, legitimately _giggled_. It was basically the cutest fucking thing Frank had ever heard. "They're finally dropping Martha? Wow, this really _has_ been a rough week for Ray."

They discussed possible Motor Milkshake salvation plans, Gerard was unfairly cute the entire time, and Frank was almost surprised when the bell rang. Usually every class period dragged by, but this one had gone by really fast. Time sure flew when you were formulating plans to save an ice cream shop with the guy you had had crush on since the 6th grade.

"I'll come in to help on Save The Milkshakes day," Gerard said as he packed up his bag. He smiled at Frank, all his weird tiny teeth on display. "I mean, if they even want me there. I wasn't much help with the shit river."

"You gotta come. _I_ want you there," Frank said without thinking, and surprise flitted across Gerard's face. Frank felt his face get hot - why the fuck did he have to say stuff like that? No wonder all his friends made fun of him for this shit. "Like, I think you helped a lot. With the shit river," he added quickly. Wow, nice cover.

Gerard chuckled. Frank wanted to actually be dead. "Okay, I'll come."

Frank thought about those .2 seconds of awkward interaction for the rest of the fucking day.

* * *

When _SAVE THE MILKSHAKES_ day arrived the next Saturday, Frank was still pretty sure the whole thing was going to be a failure. Gerard had somehow gotten roped into not only helping but painting kids' faces, which probably wasn't sanitary to do in the shop or something but, hey, selling ice cream for an hour in a store half-flooded with toilet hadn't been either. What was one more health code violation at that point, really? Mikey also reported that Julie had told him during class the day before that she would definitely be coming at some point during the day which meant Ray would be busting nuts left and right, and the outlook on the whole thing was still looking pretty grim because selling ice cream alone probably wasn't gonna cut the fucking mustard here. But like Pete had said, Motor Milkshakes was their _hood,_ and they had to at least _try_ to save it.

"Do you think people even care enough to come?" Frank whispered to Mikey as they started setting up the ice cream tubs for the day. He didn't want Ray, who was already a fucking wreck, to overhear his doubt about the whole thing, but...things weren't looking great. "I mean, it's just a ice cream store. Do people give a shit if it closes?"

Mikey shrugged. "My grandma told me she convinced her entire knitting circle to come, so at the very least there's gonna be about 25 senile old women in here ready to buy shit and support her 'darling grandson'." He rolled his eyes. "I don't know if the 'darling grandson' is me or Gerard, but they're coming either way."

Pete, who had come out of the back room holding a tub of SPF 100, the ever-popular vanilla bean flavor that they had made triple batches of in the days before Save The Milkshakes day just to make sure they didn't run out, just laughed. "I'm sure people will come," he said, and Frank admired his optimism considering sales had been at all time low in the week and a half following the shit river incident. People just didn't wanna eat at a place that had been flooded with used toilet water less than two weeks prior, and Frank really couldn't blame them. "But if things get slow, we can always put Mikey in a gold bikini like Princess Leia! He's the eye candy, after all." Pete winked.

Mikey gave him an unenthusiastic look. "Listen. I'm like 95% sure Julie has some kind of weird crush on me, and I don't wanna do anything to encourage her. When she and her weird leather backpack roll in here, I better be fully clothed."

To Frank's surprise, though, when they opened, _a lot_ of people started coming in. Like, way more people than they usually got on random Saturdays in February. People really _did_ seem to care. It warmed Frank's jaded heart.

"It was totally because of my fliers," Pete insisted when Frank commented on the influx of people. "I wrote all about all the cherished childhood memories people had here and shit. Total pathos. Gets 'em every time."

"Wow. I admire your use of rhetorical devices," Patrick said as he made a No Comment milkshake with strawberries and fucking _gummi bears_ mixed in for some crazy fuck. Another Save The Milkshakes day gimmick - you could have literally whatever the hell you wanted. If you wanted gummi bears mixed into your goddamn milkshake, for this one day only you could have it. Bob was literally losing his mind over the amount of toppings he was being forced to allow people.

"If only you could use your mad rhetoric skills for good instead of manipulating people into buying ice cream," Frank snickered. "Then you would be golden."

"I'm gonna start writing songs and I'm gonna have a fucking band, it's gonna be awesome," Pete insisted. "Like, I'm talking sold-out tours. Mark my words."

"Yeah, okay," said Bob flatly. "For now, put sprinkles on this." He handed Pete a cone with definitely not the weirdest order Frank had seen that day, but probably one of the grossest: Thick, mixed with Stepmom, the cherry flavor. Rocky Road and fucking _cherry._ Jesus, people were nasty.

"Thick and Stepmom mixed together. I love it. I'm inspired," Frank said under his breath.

Bob laughed. "I call it Thick Mom."

"Who ordered this?" Pete asked, gesturing to the now-sprinkled Thick Mom. "There's too many people. I can't tell who this was supposed to go to."

"Gerard. He said he wanted to make sure he was 'personally supporting' the cause or something," Bob said. Frank should've known, honestly; of course Gerard would order the weirdest fucking thing possible. It was part of his whole quirky art school kid persona.

Pete laughed. "In that case, why doesn't _Frankie_ bring it over to him?" He handed Frank the Thick Mom and shooed him away before he could protest.

Navigating his way across the crowded store carrying a double scoop of _Thick Mom_ to the table where Gerard was set up with his face paint to help support the Motor Milkshakes cause without dropping it was a challenge in and of itself, but the added stress of knowing today could be the difference between the store staying open or closing and there was _no_ room for fuck ups made it almost impossible. Gerard being stupidly cute painting little kids' faces within Frank's line of sight definitely didn't help.

"Here, I hope you appreciate this, because I almost died getting it over here for you," he said when he finally made the million-mile journey to the other side of the store. He placed the ice cream on the table a safe distance away from the paint, _just_ in case. Nobody could be too careful on Save The Milkshakes day.

Gerard was busy putting the finishing touches on a cartoon vampire he had painted on a kid who had to be six or seven years old at most's face. This kid and Gerard must have gotten along great. "Oh, thanks, Frank!" he said brightly, and then pulled his brush away from the kid's face. "There," he said, and handed the kid a mirror.

"Oh, good!" said the kid. "He's a nice vampire. I like vampires, but only nice ones."

Frank laughed. "Me, too." He surveyed the little vampire caricature. It was cute; it sort of looked like Casper the Friendly Ghost or something, only a vampire. The art style looked strangely familiar, but Gerard's style was pretty distinct, so Frank figured that was from all the years of sneaking peeks at Gerard's art at Mikey's house. Still, he swore he knew that style from somewhere else, but he didn't have that much time to ponder it before Ray called across the store, "Frank! Come here! Important!"

Gerard chuckled, and Frank swore to God those weird fucking tiny teeth were gonna be the death of him. Was thinking someone's teeth were cute weird? Did that qualify as some kind of fucked-up kink. Honestly, probably. "Guess you gotta get back over there," Gerard said. "It's _important."_

Frank sighed. "He probably spilled the gummi bears _again."_ He took a second to make sure the kid, whose Mom had come and dragged him away from the facepaint table, was out of earshot before murmuring, "I overheard him calling gummi bears 'booty snacks' whatever the _fuck_ that means, and I'm starting to wonder if he's doing this on purpose."

" _Booty snacks?"_ Gerard questioned. "Sounds kinky. I'm in."

Frank tried to ignore Gerard calling anything _kinky_ on the trip back across the restaurant, but it was honestly pretty difficult. The horde of about two dozen retirees who had just showed up that had to be Mikey and Gerard's grandma's knitting circle was a conveniently timed boner-killer, though. Knowing someone's _grandmother_ was within a ten-foot radius made it kinda hard to think about their potential kinks. _Hard,_ but not _impossible._

"What, Ray?" Frank demanded in a stage whisper. "Do you know what you just pulled me away from? Gerard calling things _kinky._ I know, like, your family's store is in peril and shit, but this is my love life we're talking about!"

Ray gave him an unimpressed look. "Listen. I know your life's goal is to bone Gerard or whatever, but you're not gonna believe it - that fucking baby doll could help save the store," he whispered.

It took Frank a minute to even process what Ray was talking about. "You mean - Baby Frnk?" He glanced back at Baby Frnk, who was surveying the retiree crowd with his painted-on eyes. "What, is he gonna curse them all into buying Thick Moms?"

"No - they want to buy _him,_ " Ray said in disbelief. "They're _arguing_ about it."

Frank thought maybe Ray was joking or something, because he couldn't imagine anyone in their right mind _fighting_ over Baby Frnk, Motor Milkshake's resident voodoo doll, but when he looked over at the end of the counter where they had conglomerated to pick up their ice creams, they were _all_ bombarding poor Otter, who barely understood where Baby Frnk had even _come from,_ with questions about where they could buy a doll like that or if they could buy that specific doll from him. Jesus - Frank vaguely remembered Mikey saying something about his grandma having a "creepy doll room" where she kept her collection of antique dolls, but he hadn't realized that apparently her _entire_ knitting group also shared that passion.

"You want us to _sell_ Baby Frnk? How much money could we even make from that?" Frank asked.

Mikey, who had emerged from the back room with the backup SPF 100, shrugged. "Okay, I don't see my grandma here, but that's definitely her, uh, _squad,_ and _a lot_ of them collect dolls. Like, they have discussions about it. They take this shit seriously. You could probably make, like, six hundred bucks off that thing if you get them in a bidding war over it." Frank's eyes widened. Ray looked like he was about to start shitting again from the pure disbelief. Six hundred bucks was, like, the equivalent of 200 small cones. It probably wouldn't put them over the goal or anything, but it would definitely _help._ "I'm not kidding. They get _competitive."_

Pete looked so excited about the prospect of starting a retiree catfight over Baby Frnk that he accidentally moved the nozzle of the caramel sauce he was adding to someone's sundae and almost shot caramel directly across the room, but Ray thankfully moved the bottle. Frank wondered if being the unofficial Motor Milkshakes teen employee wrangler ever felt kinda like babysitting for Ray. "What are we waiting for! Let's start an auction or something! Baby Frnk goes to the highest bidder!" Pete said gleefully, apparently unaware he had just almost projectile-squirted caramel at paying customers, including Julie, who had just walked in and was now walking backwards for some damn reason around Gerard's table, probably telling him another water-skiing story that no one gave a shit about. Frank kind of envied her, though - it took him approximately 45 years and a Motor Milkshakes crisis to finally have a one-on-one discussion with Gerard, meanwhile Julie could just roll up and tell him every boring fucking detail of her boring fucking life like it was no biggie. Sure, no one other than Ray liked her at all, but at least she was putting herself out there.

"I second the auction idea," Bob said, eyeing the crowd of women. "It makes money _and_ gets the haunted doll out. Two birds with one stone."

"Do you care, Frank?" Ray asked seriously. "I mean, it's still your doll or whatever."

"I mean, not really," Frank shrugged. Baby Frnk would probably find a better home with one of these doll collector women than him anyway. "You could auction it if you want."

"Auction what?" asked Gerard, who had come up to the counter carrying the box full of the money he had earned for the cause. He had a spot of red paint of his nose that kinda made him look like Rudolph and was so cute Frank actually thought he felt a tear coming to his eye. It was on that next level of shit.

"Baby Frnk!" Pete said joyfully. Gerard's eyebrows knit together.

"Who?"

"Baby Frnk!" Pete repeated. "The doll someone sent here that looks like Frank and is probably cursed!" He shrugged, like auctioning a "probably cursed" baby doll in an ice cream shop was a routine thing. He pointed at Baby Frnk, still on top of the Snapple fridge where Frank had put him in the first place.

Gerard's eyes followed where Pete was pointing, and when he saw Baby Frnk his face actually went _white._ Like, all the blood rushed out of it in the span of about two seconds, which Frank thought only happened on TV. What the fuck - was Gerard afraid of dolls or something? Or was Baby Frnk actually cursed and using his voodoo magic? Frank didn't know, but Gerard looked like he was about a minute away from fainting all of a sudden, and there was _no_ explanation as to why.

"Uh, are you okay, Gee?" Mikey asked, looking concerned.

"You can't sell that!" Gerard sputtered, shaking his head.

"Why?" Bob demanded. "Do you know it from somewhere? Is it legit haunted? If it is, I say we sell it anyway and get it out of the store. I'm not fucking with ghosts. This isn't The Conjuring."

Gerard looked at the floor and the tops of his ears turned pink. It _might_ have been cute if he didn't look five seconds away from passing out. "You can't because -" he took a deep breath, like he was preparing for the confession of a lifetime. "I made it. It was for Frank. I want him to have it."

Frank wasn't sure what happened for about the next thirty seconds after that, because he pretty much blacked out from the shock. _Gerard_ had made Baby Frnk. _Gerard_ had taken the time to painstakingly paint a pretty cartoon portrait of Frank on a fucking baby doll. Frank wasn't sure what the _fuck_ that signified, but it meant that at least Gerard had been _thinking_ about him, enough to make a _doll_ for him. That was where Frank had known Gerard's art style from - it was the same one on Baby Frnk! If it had been anyone else Frank probably would've been creeped out, but it was _Gerard,_ who was pretty much the weirdest and sweetest person on earth. It was _cute._

" _What?"_ Frank sputtered. Considering even Mikey looked pretty surprised, no one must have known about Baby Frnk. Gerard looked at the floor.

"I don't know…" he murmured. His entire face was some nuclear shade of pink, and Frank didn't even want to _entertain_ the idea that maybe, _maybe_ this had been Gerard's freaky art kid way of showing Frank that he liked him because he didn't wanna get his hopes up, but that was the only reason he could think of for why Gerard was acting so fucking...bashful about it.

"Oh, my god," Pete breathed, like he was watching a soap opera. As The Milkshake Motors, episode 107: The event to save the store from closing after Ray floods it with his shit goes awry when it turns out Gerard was the one behind the mysterious doll that had shown up a week earlier.

"I guess," Gerard said haltingly, "I like you. Or, not _I guess,_ what the fuck am I _saying,_ I _do,_ I do like you, Frank, and I have for a long time, and I'm a fucking _creep_ so I decide to make this weird doll for you - I know that's messed up, oh my _God -"_

He was totally rambling by that point, but Frank hadn't really heard anything past "I like you". Gerard liked him _back._ The guy Frank had had a crush on since 6th grade liked him _back._ He was about to either cry or break into a cold sweat.

"I like you, too!" Frank blurted out, and he had kinda forgotten he was working because none of the last three minutes had felt real anyway until all the customers looked over to see who the fuck was yelling through the store. Smooth.

Gerard looked up, surprise evident on his face. "You _do?_ "

"Do you guys want a minute in the back room or something? Like, I know you're confessing your undying love and it's important and shit, but we're holding up sales," Ray said under his breath. Oh, yeah, they were supposed to be selling ice cream and shit, Frank had forgotten about that part. He was too busy literally shitting himself, thanks.

"Ray!" Pete scolded. "Frank's been waiting for this for, like, five years, I can't believe you're ruining the moment!"

Gerard's eyes widened. " _Five years?_ What?"

Frank covered his face. "Can we just, like, talk about this in the back room? Where Pete isn't there to embarrass me anymore?"

Gerard looked about as nervous as Frank felt, but he laughed and it was genuine and light and Frank kinda wanted to cry again because _Gerard liked him back,_ and frankly in that moment that was all he really cared about.

* * *

Of all the times he had ever imagined finally getting together with Gerard - and it was an embarrassingly high amount - the supremely water-damaged Motor Milkshakes back room was pretty much the last place Frank had ever thought it would happen. But there he was, with Gerard, and they were talking about how they had secretly liked each other the _whole fucking time._ Frank thought he was in a dream.

"I think I knew, hmm…" Gerard said, tapping his chin. His face had calmed down from Pepto Bismol pink, and he looked so fucking happy Frank couldn't believe it. Gerard was happy because Frank liked him. _Gerard liked him back._ Frank couldn't get over it. "When you came on vacation with us to Disney, and I puked on Splash Mountain, and everyone was laughing because it was fucking funny but I was so embarrassed, and you told a story about when _you_ puked on the Dumbo ride so everyone would make fun of you and not me, because it's _way_ more embarrassing to puke on Dumbo than on Splash Mountain." Gerard smiled at the memory, and he had to be telling the truth because no one smiled at memories of themselves puking under normal circumstances. Frank wondered when his life got so puke-story-centric. "I think I fell in middle school love right there."

Frank laughed. "That was _years_ ago - I think I was in _7th grade._ You've liked me since I was in _7th fucking grade,_ and you never said anything until _now?"_

Gerard looked at him accusingly. "Well, apparently _you_ liked me even before that, and you never said anything either." He took Frank's hand hesitantly and swung it between them, and Frank didn't even care that Gerard was definitely getting paint all over his hand. "But I guess I was the freak who made you an _anonymous baby doll_ , so who am I to talk?"

Frank squeezed Gerard's hand. "Why did you spell my name as 'Frnk', by the way? You can't spell _Frank?"_ he teased.

"Shut up, it was an _accident._ I was in a rush. I didn't even notice. I had no idea what you guys were talking about when you said 'Baby Frnk'."

"I knew I knew that art style from somewhere," Frank said. "It's the same as on all the figurines you used to make! I thought those were the _shit."_

Gerard shrugged. "I upgraded from figurines to dolls - I know that's, like, super weird. I just like painting their faces. Yours took me _so many tries_ to get right - wow, I sound fucking creepy," he mused. Frank had to admit painting dolls was kind of a weird hobby for a high school senior, but Gerard wasn't really your average high school senior, and honestly, Frank shouldn't have expected anything less from him. "I would finish them and they wouldn't look enough like you, so then I had to restart. I have at least ten mess-up dolls just hanging out in my room…" He shook his head. "There is no way to make that not sound creepy. I'm sorry."

Frank's eyes widened. "Wait. You have more? More dolls?"

Gerard cocked his head. "Yeah?"

"Oh my god...not to kill the moment or whatever, but could we auction _those_ to your grandma's knitting group? I mean, ten dolls...That could make so much money. That could save the store!" Who would've guessed - Baby Frnk might have unlocked the mystery of how to save Motor Milkshakes, _and_ gotten Frank a fucking boyfriend. Maybe he wasn't cursed after all.

"That's a great idea! Holy shit!" Gerard exclaimed. "Yeah! I can go get them right now and be back in, like, ten minutes. Oh my god." He smiled wryly at Frank. " _And_ it'll give me an excuse to get out of here quick before Julie starts lamenting to me about how she didn't get into AP art. _Again."_

Frank laughed and he felt it in his entire body. "Make sure Ray takes his _medication_ before you tell him where you're going. He's about to flood the store again."

* * *

Mikey had not been kidding when he said his grandma's knitting group took their dolls fucking seriously. When Gerard came back to the store with _nine_ Baby Frnk lookalikes ready for them to bid on, Frank thought an actual riot was going to break out. The original Baby Frnk wasn't going anywhere, though - after all, Gerard had made it for him.

("Okay, how the fuck did none of us know he paints dolls? That's a pretty big thing we all missed," Otter said in disbelief when Gerard had rolled back up to the store with his army of Baby Frnks.

"Uh, even I didn't know about this," Mikey said. "The less I know about what he does down in his basement, the better.")

All nine of the Baby Frnks had gone for _literal hundreds_ each. Pretty much the entire Motor Milkshakes staff had watched on in disbelief as Pete animatedly auctioned off the dolls and the knitting group got into heated bidding wars over _every single one._ The entire store kinda forgot about the whole ice cream thing - everyone, including the customers, was way too into watching these old women duke it out for Gerard's master creations. If comics or whatever the fuck didn't work out for Gerard, Frank thought he should definitely start some kind of doll business, because he clearly had something pretty special going on there.

When the store finally closed, everyone sat around the tables to count all the money from the dolls and the facepaint and all the extra toppings that had come straight out of Bob's worst nightmares. It was so intense Frank thought he was literally going to start dripping sweat - this was it. If they hadn't made enough money, the store was done.

When they finished, Brian took out his calculator and started adding up all the totals everyone had calculated. Ray looked about a second away from a heart attack, and Frank couldn't blame him. He gripped Gerard's hand, and Gerard smiled at him, and that almost made Frank feel better. Jesus. The tiny teeth were going to bring Frank the inner peace he had always been missing. "Okay, so…" Brian said, biting his pen as he added up the totals.

"Can we cut with the suspense shit?" Bob asked. "Oh my god."

" _Patience,"_ Patrick insisted, even though no one in the room looked even remotely patient.

Brian plugged the last number in. "So, we made...holy shit. Holy _shit_."

"Is it enough?" Ray demanded. "Is it enough?"

Brian laughed, wholeheartedly laughed in the most profound display of relief Frank had ever seen. "Just barely. Just barely, we made enough. _We made enough_. The fucking doll saved the store."

"We made enough?" Ray asked in disbelief.

"Oh my god," Pete exclaimed. "I'm not gonna have to go back to working at Dollar Tree! Hallelujah!"

Everyone erupted in cheers, and Frank hugged Gerard so hard he thought he might actually break him, but that was okay. Gerard's fucking dolls had saved the store. Motor Milkshakes was going to live to see another day.

"Wait!" Ray exclaimed. "I just remembered - I never put out the flavor raffle! I thought this was gonna be a miserable fucking failure, honestly, so I never put the raffle out." Wow, Ray _really_ must have been relieved, then. Frank thought he saw him breathe for the first time in about two weeks. "What are we gonna call the new flavor?"

Otter rolled his eyes. "I like how that's your biggest concern right now. Your store got saved two minutes ago, and you're already thinking about flavor names."

Mikey shrugged. "Call it Baby Frnk. He can be, like, our mascot."

Gerard laughed and rubbed Frank's back, and Frank kinda wanted to live in that exact moment forever, because everything was _good._ "I like that. I know I don't work here but, like, I second that."

"You just fucking saved the store with your voodoo dolls," Bob said. "I think you deserve a vote."

So that was how Baby Frnk, Motor Milkshake's own personal probably-cursed doll, became the namesake of their newest flavor, and the store didn't close despite the shit river catastrophe, and Pete didn't have to go back to working at Dollar Tree, and Frank got to date the guy he had had a crush on since the 6th fucking grade, and everything actually worked out for once at Motor Milkshakes, the place where literally everything that could go wrong would go wrong. And sure, Frank still wanted to piss himself laughing every time someone ordered a large Bust a Nut or any of the other eight million weird-ass flavors they served at Motor Milkshakes, but whenever someone ordered a Baby Frnk, he couldn't help but smile, cast a glance back at the real Baby Frnk still perched on top of the Snapple fridge, and thank his lucky stars for all the blessings that highly cursed object had brought him.

**Author's Note:**

> i am sad to report this monstrosity does not pass the bechdel test
> 
> thnx 4 reading phrends!!!!


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